NEWS: Wiki-Wiki-Whack

CULTURE: Wiki-Wiki-Whack

John Seigenthaler Sr., was RFK's personal assistant in the 60's and--at least according to his bio on the popular online encyclopedia, Wikipedia--was suspected of being involved with both Kennedy assassinations. This assertion was bolstered by the fact (again, according to Wikipedia) that Seigenthaler lived in the USSR during the 70s and 80s.

Of course, none of this was true. At all.

Just like it says on the front page, "Welcome to Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia that anyone can edit."

1 quadrillion points for the headline.

ohh.... I ran in here thinking it was early 90's rap.... thats pretty fucking bad though, I can imagine they guy must be hurt. unless......mabey the truth is coming to the surface and they want us to think its fraud...but mabey they were expecting us to think that so they did the opposite and let the truth out and then.... then... my head hurts.

Forgive me, but I don't see why this is news. You should never take Wikipedia as gospel, because obviously bad edits sneak through. That's why you can't ever use Wikipedia on a term paper or anything like that, and why if you have anything more than a casual interest, you should check the facts. It seems so inherently obvious. But if the implication is that Wikipedia is crap, I don't follow. It's a helpful starting point for research, just because of the links at the bottom and because it's like Cliff's Notes. Obviously other news sources override it.

Damn it Ted, I though you retired from the news.

A bad edit on wikipedia? No way!

If you want to do yourself a favor, stay away from ANY of the political articles on wiki. They will always have some bizzarre slant one way or another. This is fact and anyone who is even remotely familiar with the site is well aware of this. Hardly news.

Edit: Oh wait I forgot how it would be in this site's best interest to post anything and everything negative about wikipedia.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suicide_Girls

[Edited on Dec 04, 2005 11:15AM]

You didn't know? PointBlank is SG's new media hatchetman. He's the Sean Hannity of the website.

Tell it to the New York Times, crybaby.



(link courtesy of Dr_Frank)

I saw an entrty once that went something along these lines....

Bob-Associated with being in the water; floating up and down
Bob-my bastard former roomate who skipped out without paying the two months of rent he owed me.

HatTip: http://urbandictionary.com

Clearly, John Siegenthaler, The New York Times and USA today have all teamed up with me to bring Wikipedia down!! Mwuahaha.

You know, you guys who say "this isn't news!!111" over and fucking over might want to get a grip, and realize that if it's covered by the NYT, or another newspaper--it IS news. The guy was slandered by an encyclopedia, and the slander was picked up by other sources--that makes it a "news story," I'm not sure why that's so hard to figure out.

I'm not sure what the SG entry in wikipedia has to do with anything I wrote, since I've never read it. Also, for the record: I love WIkipedia and use it often, but too many people think that the articles are 100% correct, and they're not. I thought this case was an interesting one to counter that idea, and clearly I wasn't alone.

[Edited on Dec 04, 2005 by PointBlank]

From the current Wikipedia entry on Seigenthaler:

The highlighted section is the most disturbing part. Seriously, WTF?

Also, if anyone else says "How is this news?" in an article I push through, I'm going to respond with "Because I fucking say it's news". Fuck me, I'm tired of hearing that.

Not to mention, Wikipedia founder admits to serious quality problems. I'm not sure if you need to be registered to see this story or not.

I really wish the article being linked to were more neutral, but it is an op/ed piece, so I suppose I can't complain. Though I find it disheartening to think that that

is the first, and maybe only, thing people will hear about Wikipedia.

True.

I submitted the story before the NYTimes article came out...and that one is a lot better for unbiased information.

hey, my rabbi used to tell us that story!

Traditional encyclopedias are written by people also and will incorporate their biases and misinformation also. True, they go through a much more rigorous quality control process than Wikipedia...but once they're in print, they're unchanged until next edition.

Which is to say, wikis should certainly be taken with a grain of salt, but so should most other sources of information.

As I understand it, Wiki entries are not screened by staff before going up, so the owners of the website are not liable for any bad information in wiki. If they were liable for every mistake, they would be out of business.

Similarly, the owners of SG aren't liable if someone puts bad info in their journal.

Of course, I could be wrong, but it seems to make sense to me.

I am not suggesting that Wikipedia should necessarily be culpable for what an editor posts there. Just that libel and slander not be able to hide behind such anonymity. I mean really, what possible justification is there to prevent a potentially injured party from even finding out who injured them?

If the RIAA can compel the identity of illegal downloaders from their ISPs, shouldn't this guy be able to compel the identity of the source of such libelous statements?

You know, even when I wrote that I kind of thought it was dumb. And yet somehow it didn't escape an edit. But doesn't this seem whiny? Not that I'd be thrilled either, but anybody with any knowledge of the guy could have corrected this easily. The fact that nobody knew who the hell this guy was makes this sort of thing possible, and that's just an inherent problem with the internet. I don't see the need for op-ed columns and the like. I dunno. Maybe Wikipedia should make big ol' disclaimers so no one can claim they didn't know.

Clearly, this is not news.

Saw it on CNN this morning too.

The Channel of Not News?

[Edited on Dec 05, 2005 by PointBlank]

Hey, didn't CNN make an AP-written press release for Cindy Sheehan's new book front-page news on their website a little while back? It's in Fark's Farkives, in case you wanted to look. I don't remember where...